Martian moon Phobos and "Phobos Mystery Object", photographed in 1989 by a Russian spacecraft not long before all contact was lost.
Posted on 08/04/2005 11:19:43 AM PDT by jb6
MOSCOW, August 4 (RIA Novosti) - Russia will start an experimental program for preparation for flights to Mars in 2006, said Anatoly Perminov, head of the Russian Space Agency Roscosmos.
"The agency is not planning a manned flight to Mars until 2015, although we will start an experimental program at the Institute of Medical and Biological Research next year," he told the Voice of Russia state-controlled radio station. "An international six-men crew will conduct a simulated 500-day flight to Mars."
Perminov said Russia would send a probe to Phobos, one of Mars' two moons, to test launch, landing and take-off procedures, soil sampling and practice the return flight to Earth.
Perminov also said Russia planned to continue its space tourism program.
"First of all, it is a way to finance the future development of the space program and secondly, it gives people without serious training the opportunity to make a space trip," he said.
Perminov said the flights to the International Space Station offered by Roscosmos were safer than sub-orbital flights advertised in the United States.
Perminov also described Russia's plans for strategic development of space research and exploration.
He mentioned space exploration, manned space flights and deep space scientific research among long term prospects and called the creation or modernization of an orbital group of satellites for various purposes, especially telecommunication satellites, a short-term priority.
"The agency can successfully achieve its long-term goals only through international cooperation," he said.
Perminov also said Russia was developing the Clipper space shuttle to combine the reliability of the Soyuz spacecraft and the comfort of U.S. space shuttles and feature increased cargo capacity.
The new spacecraft is designed to carry a six-man crew, including a pilot, an engineer and four passengers or researchers. It will be capable of 24 flights
?.....Russia plans flight to Mars and development of Gulag?
The things we could do if our president had the balls to put our mars ambitions into action.
Perminov's head is filled with permafrost.
I love when NASA complains that no one is interested in the public in what they do: yes putting up satellites and standard shuttle flights are just sooooo exciting. Do something cool (like the comet impact) and you'll generate support.
Why? Even the Indians and Chinese are working on catching up with NASA and what is there to catch up to?
A new Space Race. And one we should easily win, if we have the national will.
Do they call that "Rosco" for short?
Answer me this without looking it up: who was the mission commander of the space shuttle that went up and successfully landed prior to the Columbia disaster?
Answer me this without looking it up: who was the fourth man to walk on the moon?
And finally, answer me this: do you honestly think that NASA just whimsically ended its Apollo program? Or was it forced to end because the American public lost interest and Congress thus cut NASA's funding?
Your answers tell the whole story.
Unfortunately, our government is too busy codding illegal aliens, sucking up resources into social programs, and propagandizing that Islam is a "religion of peace" to bother with incentives for the space program.
Martian moon Phobos and "Phobos Mystery Object", photographed in 1989 by a Russian spacecraft not long before all contact was lost.
Bull. Russia couldn't do it. Hell, it wasn't until after we had landed men on the moon several times that Russia managed to get a probe on the moon.
Russia's space agency is heavily business interested (aka the whole tourism angle)
Sure...and the average guy has $100,000,000.00 to spare for such a journey.
What crap. Russia isn't "business interested"; its space agency is starved for cash and is desperately soliciting funding. Hell, the American government has been propping Russia's space agency for years.
Care to elaberate the story?
Aeroflot in a vacuum.
When Russian scientists toured a facility I was visiting, all present were sternly warned not to bring up Phobos. It was a real sore point with the Russkies.
Propping Russia's space agency? Who the hell do you think was feeding our guy on the space station when NASA took a break from sending rockets to space? If not for the Russian Agency our guy would be dead now.
First, it's $20 million to go up (and if you haven't figured it out there are plenty of people with the cash and the will to go), the $100 million was proposed for a lunar fly by. Cash starved is a good reason to go pro-business, or are you rather on the lets subsidize everything with tax payers expense kind? We give NASA a billion a year and what do we get? The first launch in 2 years almost turns into a trajedy and is already a national embaressment.
NASA went bonkers when Tito was planning to go up, screaming that no "civilian" was fit to go and only the properly trained "elites". WRONG. The inbreeding at NASA is why we're sucking.
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